Saturday, December 29, 2012

A bad year for journalism

2012 was not a good year for journalism and the supporters of the media freedom and netizens.

Looking in depth at the latest RsF report, it looks as the situation worsened in many respects in comparison with the previous years. According to the declarations of the organizations' officials, it looks as the worst year since 1995.

In comparison with the previous year, 88 journalists were killed, an increased of 33%. 879 were arrested (1044 the previous year), 38 kidnapped (compared with 71 one year before), 73 were forced to flee abroad (77 in 2011). The apparition of netizens meant also a high price in terms of victims: 47 of them were killed this year, especially in Syria and North of Africa.

The most dangerous countries to write are: Syria, Somalia, Pakistan, Mexico and Brazil. Using the power of work here could be often faced by the power of guns. The five biggest prisons for journalists are located in Turkey, China, Eritrea, Iran and Syria.

What's next? The journalists will continue to write while the oppressive governments will continue to do their oppressive jobs as long as there will be not enough international pressures to make them stop. This is the never ending story of human evolution, isn't it?

The latest news about the freedom of the media is the hard time of journalists in Italy, where the representatives of a newspaper in Northern Italy were threatened, an occasion for OSCE to urges investigations into threat.

Foreign Policy Focus Blog

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